muck
2013
potentially the only good thing to come out of the open-world-survival-craft period that wasn't a factory sim (i.e. modded minecraft clone).
1998
is [sort of] to Resident Evil what Metroid Fusion is to Super Metroid. that is to say, the game is a lot more linear than it's immediate predecessor, or at least feels more linear. also much easier and much shorter, despite sporting higher enemy density and taking place over a larger diegetic area. perhaps for all of if not strictly those reasons, the game is worse. the loop of 1 wherein one attempts to make the most of each of their dangerous saves to the end of conserving ink ribbons is gone in spirit if still technically present; combat is too easy and ink ribbons are too plentiful, and the structure of the world means you'll rarely be using the same typewriter twice if you are over-conserving due to lingering instincts from the previous game (as i did). you're given multiple weapons (at least as Claire) that you don't even really need and will have plenty of ammo for by the time the game ends.
still, like Fusion, it's ultimately a good game; the most notable improvement relative to 1 being that the dialogue writing and voice acting are vastly improved to the point where you no longer notice how comically bad it is, though it is still often on-the-nose or stilted. another is that the aesthetics are even more on point here: the pre-rendered environments far more detailed, especially noticeable in the introductory alleyways of the city, and Birkin is gross in a way 1 never was.
still, like Fusion, it's ultimately a good game; the most notable improvement relative to 1 being that the dialogue writing and voice acting are vastly improved to the point where you no longer notice how comically bad it is, though it is still often on-the-nose or stilted. another is that the aesthetics are even more on point here: the pre-rendered environments far more detailed, especially noticeable in the introductory alleyways of the city, and Birkin is gross in a way 1 never was.
1989
significant improvement over the previous entry in every way; far less annoying enemies and other obstacles (some notable exceptions), far more consistent behavior where it matters, much better sprite work and overall aesthetics, much better music, etc. just holistically far more pleasant.
the first game had an issue a lot of games of this generation had wherein many enemy and especially boss encounters are either trivial or absurd because you can't realistically dodge their attacks. due to that, the dominant strategy -- at least given the limitations of most human beings -- is just tanking damage and shooting the enemy hoping you win. most of the bosses in Mega Man 1 require this "strategy"; some still do in 2, but it's much less. enemy behavior overall is also less buggier and more predictable, which in a similar vein allows for more neuron-activating tactical decision-making instead of mindless spam. these are all sort of "platformer 101" elements, so it's hardly high praise and compared to contemporary offerings this game still isn't very special, but given the quality of 1 noting these improvements is relevant.
also weirdly... profound? the [famous] intro, some of the levels, combined with the [famous] ending, are all very emotional and evocative for what this otherwise is. i presume that's mostly the music working its magic; actually, the music in general is very good, able to capture a lot of tones (i.e. "vibes", not musical tone) in ways that contemporaneous games don't come close to. with this game one can start to see what people see in this series.
the first game had an issue a lot of games of this generation had wherein many enemy and especially boss encounters are either trivial or absurd because you can't realistically dodge their attacks. due to that, the dominant strategy -- at least given the limitations of most human beings -- is just tanking damage and shooting the enemy hoping you win. most of the bosses in Mega Man 1 require this "strategy"; some still do in 2, but it's much less. enemy behavior overall is also less buggier and more predictable, which in a similar vein allows for more neuron-activating tactical decision-making instead of mindless spam. these are all sort of "platformer 101" elements, so it's hardly high praise and compared to contemporary offerings this game still isn't very special, but given the quality of 1 noting these improvements is relevant.
also weirdly... profound? the [famous] intro, some of the levels, combined with the [famous] ending, are all very emotional and evocative for what this otherwise is. i presume that's mostly the music working its magic; actually, the music in general is very good, able to capture a lot of tones (i.e. "vibes", not musical tone) in ways that contemporaneous games don't come close to. with this game one can start to see what people see in this series.
2003
trades subtlety for arguably having far and away the most intense atmosphere of the first three games; viscerally terrifying. the sound design here is exceptional to the point where many sounds made me think they were coming from somewhere besides my headphones. environment design is much more consistently surreal here than it was in 1-2. 1's otherworld was [to memory] exclusively abandoned fogworld contrasted with rusted red metal otherworld while 2 had some standout otherworld areas in basically the entire portion of the game beginning at the Historical Society and ending at the voyage to Lakeview. 3's environments, however, beginning around a third of the way through the game are unafraid of having utterly nonsensical geometry for large portions of their levels. several entire levels are dubious in their status as a mirror of some real world location.
by the artifice of level design which i cannot hope to understand, or by a difference in mood, i found myself actually seeking to avoid many encounters to either conserve resources or because i was actually scared. that is to say: unlike 1-2, 3 has what you would expect a survival horror game to have, or so i've been told.
so about that lack of subtlety: firstly, much of the horror elements are a bit over the top, the blood-stained amusement park mascots being emblematic of this, and secondly, the writing, while still having the awkwardness signature to the series, feels almost amateurish in how exaggerated it is at times, despite having the same writer as 2. this isn't per se an issue, perhaps it's a reflection of Heather's being a teenager, but there is less naturalism this time around, at the very least.
what is an issue however is the handling of theme towards the very end of the game: Heather and Douglas each have uncharacteristic rants about how bad religion is as if this theme was not obvious up to this point. i don't disagree with the sentiment, it is just that it is expressed with the grace of an r/atheist tipping their fedora in euphoria, and you are hearing the voice of the writer rather than the character the entire time.
by the artifice of level design which i cannot hope to understand, or by a difference in mood, i found myself actually seeking to avoid many encounters to either conserve resources or because i was actually scared. that is to say: unlike 1-2, 3 has what you would expect a survival horror game to have, or so i've been told.
so about that lack of subtlety: firstly, much of the horror elements are a bit over the top, the blood-stained amusement park mascots being emblematic of this, and secondly, the writing, while still having the awkwardness signature to the series, feels almost amateurish in how exaggerated it is at times, despite having the same writer as 2. this isn't per se an issue, perhaps it's a reflection of Heather's being a teenager, but there is less naturalism this time around, at the very least.
what is an issue however is the handling of theme towards the very end of the game: Heather and Douglas each have uncharacteristic rants about how bad religion is as if this theme was not obvious up to this point. i don't disagree with the sentiment, it is just that it is expressed with the grace of an r/atheist tipping their fedora in euphoria, and you are hearing the voice of the writer rather than the character the entire time.
2017
a roguelite trapped in the skin of a roguelike.
2018
the basic problem with Dusk is that it does little to improve upon the games it is a homage to. this wouldn't be a problem if classic first-person shooters were ever anything more than mediocre, but they aren't: Doom, Quake, Half-Life, etc. are all ultimately boring; bland repetition of geometry intended primarily as arenas for combat which actually is as simple as "shooting it until it dies" with a requirement for spatial awareness etc. rarely relevant -- but mostly you'll just be circle-strafing. it's "mindless fun", the worst kind of "fun". it's only with more experimental action-adventure games like System Shock and Deus Ex -- "immersive sims" -- and more demanding character action-inspired shooters like ULTRAKILL and Doom Eternal that the genre becomes more than a slightly more sophisticated version of Cookie Clicker.
there seems to be little thought to game-mechanical design in every aspect of the game; there are in most scenarios too many weapons which overlap too much in niche -- a classic of this genre, there are several redundant and trivial enemy types, level design is often bewilderingly poor -- often literally just being huge open spaces with spammed enemies -- and borders on the quality of something like Doom II's more infamous maps, bosses are universally too easy and uninteresting, the porn-narrative cheese of Doom et al. is mimicked with little thought, etc. the guiding principle for the game's development seems to of been "wouldn't this be cool" more than anything else.
there is one truly good level in this game, the penultimate one, and it's the best level in the game precisely because it's by far the most difficult, which makes me think that the game's real issue is that it's just far too easy (and yes, I played on Cero Miedo), never demanding too much of you or pushing you to form evermore synaptic connections; it's far too comfortable, and because of that it's largely boring.
there seems to be little thought to game-mechanical design in every aspect of the game; there are in most scenarios too many weapons which overlap too much in niche -- a classic of this genre, there are several redundant and trivial enemy types, level design is often bewilderingly poor -- often literally just being huge open spaces with spammed enemies -- and borders on the quality of something like Doom II's more infamous maps, bosses are universally too easy and uninteresting, the porn-narrative cheese of Doom et al. is mimicked with little thought, etc. the guiding principle for the game's development seems to of been "wouldn't this be cool" more than anything else.
there is one truly good level in this game, the penultimate one, and it's the best level in the game precisely because it's by far the most difficult, which makes me think that the game's real issue is that it's just far too easy (and yes, I played on Cero Miedo), never demanding too much of you or pushing you to form evermore synaptic connections; it's far too comfortable, and because of that it's largely boring.
1996
resident evil is a part of a surprisingly and increasingly marginal tradition of games that realize the intrinsic degeneracy of unlimited saves, especially quicksaves, or at least realize that saving is relevant to how one plays. thus, there are ink ribbons: a scarce resource one must expend to save their game. suddenly saving is an economic decision rather than a mindless amenity one is probably taking advantage of nigh-constantly, trivializing much of the game and removing any tension. now one is incentivized to go up to an hour or two without saving, meaning one is thinking a lot more about their actions -- and is a lot more stressed, perhaps even horrified, by potential failure.
infamously brutal in the first hour or so but unless one is filtered they quickly adapt. that brutality is, in no small part, because of how awkward and unintuitive the combat is. a part of that is the despised-by-many tank controls of course, but those are quick to learn even if there's some lingering unwieldiness that never goes away. elsewise, camera angels are often not in your favor, and even when they are it can be hard to tell if you're actually aiming at what you're trying to. combine that with scarce ammunition, healing items, and saving as aforementioned, and combat becomes both very deliberate and, when things go wrong, a desperate scramble to both avoid death and save resources, when you decide to engage in it at all. some of the threat is eventually undercut by the sheer abundance of ammunition and especially healing items later on, but it never fully goes away.
when you aren't killing dudes, you'll be exploring and navigating, and you'll be doing a lot of it. it is generally pretty difficult to make mere traversal all that interesting, but here it is pretty enjoyable. the looming threat of combat and therefore potentially death being around the corner is ever-present, and even absent any threat the world is very tightly designed. every room feels very distinct and identifiable -- to the point where, even though one is provided, you barely ever need to use your map. puzzles and similar challenges are interspersed, making it just complex enough that often enough you are not merely going from point A to point B but instead thinking a little more about what you're doing.
dialogue writing? voice acting? what do you mean? i have no idea what you are talking about.
infamously brutal in the first hour or so but unless one is filtered they quickly adapt. that brutality is, in no small part, because of how awkward and unintuitive the combat is. a part of that is the despised-by-many tank controls of course, but those are quick to learn even if there's some lingering unwieldiness that never goes away. elsewise, camera angels are often not in your favor, and even when they are it can be hard to tell if you're actually aiming at what you're trying to. combine that with scarce ammunition, healing items, and saving as aforementioned, and combat becomes both very deliberate and, when things go wrong, a desperate scramble to both avoid death and save resources, when you decide to engage in it at all. some of the threat is eventually undercut by the sheer abundance of ammunition and especially healing items later on, but it never fully goes away.
when you aren't killing dudes, you'll be exploring and navigating, and you'll be doing a lot of it. it is generally pretty difficult to make mere traversal all that interesting, but here it is pretty enjoyable. the looming threat of combat and therefore potentially death being around the corner is ever-present, and even absent any threat the world is very tightly designed. every room feels very distinct and identifiable -- to the point where, even though one is provided, you barely ever need to use your map. puzzles and similar challenges are interspersed, making it just complex enough that often enough you are not merely going from point A to point B but instead thinking a little more about what you're doing.
dialogue writing? voice acting? what do you mean? i have no idea what you are talking about.
2008
HD has better mouthfeel, by which i mean gamefeel.
2017
burdened by the intrinsic boredom of the permanent death arena; forced into essentially removing its defining mechanic and namesake since it was degenerate; no aesthetic; self-parodic.
2021
with due respect to the fact that the game is early access and still receives content updates, you can't really afford any semblance of minimalism with open world survival craft. this genre lives and dies by its sheer breadth and depth of content; see modded Minecraft for the zenith in this regard.
also a game very much in the Terraria subgenre of this genre, a subgenre that is markedly worse than the Minecraft one. combat is generally not what makes this genre interesting, and no amount of soulsbornification will change that, and the sort of half-linearity of Terraria and as thus this game is a blight on a genre that is always at its best when it fulfills its promise of being open-ended. these games are friendly to, borderline require, friends to play with; you may as well design the game around their intrinsic-motivational specialization, not in mere combat but in their trades. modded Minecraft and Don't Starve Together understand this, or at least appear to. you have the miner, the builder, the bookkeeper, the engineer, the thaumaturge, the warrior, etc. that is ultimately the vitality of this genre.
some things i like and would prefer to see in a better open world survival craft game: i like that terrain is still fully destructible even if it is not grid-based, i like that the mechanics incentivize building aesthetically pleasing structures even when players are purely focused on function, i like the atmosphere, i like the art style
previous rating: 3
also a game very much in the Terraria subgenre of this genre, a subgenre that is markedly worse than the Minecraft one. combat is generally not what makes this genre interesting, and no amount of soulsbornification will change that, and the sort of half-linearity of Terraria and as thus this game is a blight on a genre that is always at its best when it fulfills its promise of being open-ended. these games are friendly to, borderline require, friends to play with; you may as well design the game around their intrinsic-motivational specialization, not in mere combat but in their trades. modded Minecraft and Don't Starve Together understand this, or at least appear to. you have the miner, the builder, the bookkeeper, the engineer, the thaumaturge, the warrior, etc. that is ultimately the vitality of this genre.
some things i like and would prefer to see in a better open world survival craft game: i like that terrain is still fully destructible even if it is not grid-based, i like that the mechanics incentivize building aesthetically pleasing structures even when players are purely focused on function, i like the atmosphere, i like the art style
previous rating: 3
1997
significantly better than any other classic Doom game; a low bar to clear.
previous rating: 3
previous rating: 3
2001
This review contains spoilers
at many moments it's surprising that Silent Hill 2 exists in the state that it does. any amount of genuinely bizarre non-sequiturs and imagery is probably enough to make a game published by any multinational entertainment corporation's existence strange, but this game has quite a lot of it. completely nonsense sounds, inexplicable rooms, weird one-off mechanics, unintuitive puzzle solutions, awkward dialogue, etc. most media aiming to disturb in any capacity has this issue where it relies on tropes which, while they may have been novel at some point in time, are at least presently fundamentally familiar. it's really hard to get scared by Frankenstein's monster when you can find a children's costume of them at any Spirit Halloween. see also the trend of "horror" media drifting evermore towards being any genre other than horror. so it is refreshing that this game manages to avoid that pitfall despite its extravagant influence on like at least a third of horror games made after it, especially indies.
setting-wise, it's worth noting that, at least as far as I can tell, there is no malevolence, at least no supernatural malevolence. the town acts as an impersonal axis mundi for (a) plane(s) of being which render concrete the depths of your soul, but only that. whatever equanimities and/or neuroses you enter with are roughly what inform the world around you. in some ways, it's surprisingly mundane, just a mirror of reality -- this type of experience is not only not far off from many in-real-life phenomena such as religious and psychedelic experience, but is also (obviously) a straightforward metaphor for the aforementioned moods even in mundane contexts. one imagines James does not feel too wildly different in the real world relative to the Otherworld save for the fact that he's having to stomp some giant bugs or whatever in the latter.
setting-wise, it's worth noting that, at least as far as I can tell, there is no malevolence, at least no supernatural malevolence. the town acts as an impersonal axis mundi for (a) plane(s) of being which render concrete the depths of your soul, but only that. whatever equanimities and/or neuroses you enter with are roughly what inform the world around you. in some ways, it's surprisingly mundane, just a mirror of reality -- this type of experience is not only not far off from many in-real-life phenomena such as religious and psychedelic experience, but is also (obviously) a straightforward metaphor for the aforementioned moods even in mundane contexts. one imagines James does not feel too wildly different in the real world relative to the Otherworld save for the fact that he's having to stomp some giant bugs or whatever in the latter.
GAME DOES NOT EXIST ANYMORE.
1999
only technically survival horror. with exception for the first fourth of the game and maybe the last fourth, there's rarely any reason to avoid combat in no small part because combat itself is relatively easy for this supposed genre, and you are given an overabundance of ammo and healing items after the first encounter of the Otherworld to the point of death being a non-issue. combat is still enjoyable enough: the loop of knocking enemies down to stomp them never quite gets old.
since combat is unimpressive, the meat of the game lies in exploration and puzzles: with regards to the former, you're incentivized into exploring even non-mandatory areas to acquire extra resources, and the level design encourages you to investigate every nook and cranny as you often will be unable to find the way forward otherwise. as for the latter, they are generally breaks from the exploration that force you to spend quite a lot of cognitive effort in solving them. the contrast between largely automatic exploration + combat interspersed with puzzles is something one imagines might actually be pretty niche due to the amount of self-direction required for it ("lack of hand-holding"), but for that niche it's pretty engaging, to the point where i question the inclusion of combat at all.
if there is any major flaw, it is the fact that the superficial appearance of an esoteric, obscure, and mysterious game quickly fades in the face of the reality of how dead simple it is: with one exception, the game is dissonantly easy for how bizarre it's atmosphere and narrative is (or at least is trying to be). this is a fundamental issue with any game that has an esoteric atmosphere/narrative and still wants to be largely accessible, but it's worth mentioning since at least a few games have managed to solve the issue.
since combat is unimpressive, the meat of the game lies in exploration and puzzles: with regards to the former, you're incentivized into exploring even non-mandatory areas to acquire extra resources, and the level design encourages you to investigate every nook and cranny as you often will be unable to find the way forward otherwise. as for the latter, they are generally breaks from the exploration that force you to spend quite a lot of cognitive effort in solving them. the contrast between largely automatic exploration + combat interspersed with puzzles is something one imagines might actually be pretty niche due to the amount of self-direction required for it ("lack of hand-holding"), but for that niche it's pretty engaging, to the point where i question the inclusion of combat at all.
if there is any major flaw, it is the fact that the superficial appearance of an esoteric, obscure, and mysterious game quickly fades in the face of the reality of how dead simple it is: with one exception, the game is dissonantly easy for how bizarre it's atmosphere and narrative is (or at least is trying to be). this is a fundamental issue with any game that has an esoteric atmosphere/narrative and still wants to be largely accessible, but it's worth mentioning since at least a few games have managed to solve the issue.
1987
a game with very satisfying base mechanics. as far as i know, the first if not one of the first platformers to give you the full, momentumless air control this series is known for, which feels very liberating relative to something like Castlevania. compared to most other platformers this game also has a high focus on combat and dodging enemy attacks instead of platforming which paired with most levels being fairly difficult makes for a game of attempting levels multiple times until trivialization through mastery; with exception for the ecstasy of defeating some particularly difficult bosses, this is the nicest part of the game.
despite all of that, is extremely rough around the edges. some enemies and hazards are just straight up annoying and poorly designed, many checkpoints are very bizarrely placed (why not have dedicated rooms for checkpoints?), many edge-of-the-screen spawning enemies are unpredictable to a fault or at least seemingly so, a specific enemy which doubles as a floating platform behaves annoyingly and lethally inconsistently, etc. additionally, bosses are generally poorly designed. many of them seem nigh-impossible to defeat without taking damage (at least without cheesing their AI), meaning tanking and out-damaging them is generally the way to go, especially when you can nuke them if you possess their weakness. difficulty is rather excessive, though not as much as others make it out to be. many levels overstayed their welcome and their are some brutal spikes (the beginning of Gutsman's stage, Yellow Devil (if you aren't a cheater who uses the pause-resume trick), the final Wily stage, though that last one is arguably acceptable). any one of these in isolation is not a huge deal, but combined they bring the game down quite a lot.
COMPLETED WITHOUT SAVESTATE ABUSE
despite all of that, is extremely rough around the edges. some enemies and hazards are just straight up annoying and poorly designed, many checkpoints are very bizarrely placed (why not have dedicated rooms for checkpoints?), many edge-of-the-screen spawning enemies are unpredictable to a fault or at least seemingly so, a specific enemy which doubles as a floating platform behaves annoyingly and lethally inconsistently, etc. additionally, bosses are generally poorly designed. many of them seem nigh-impossible to defeat without taking damage (at least without cheesing their AI), meaning tanking and out-damaging them is generally the way to go, especially when you can nuke them if you possess their weakness. difficulty is rather excessive, though not as much as others make it out to be. many levels overstayed their welcome and their are some brutal spikes (the beginning of Gutsman's stage, Yellow Devil (if you aren't a cheater who uses the pause-resume trick), the final Wily stage, though that last one is arguably acceptable). any one of these in isolation is not a huge deal, but combined they bring the game down quite a lot.
COMPLETED WITHOUT SAVESTATE ABUSE